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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Traditional husbands, modern wives? Constructing marriages in a South African township
Author:Van der Vliet, Virginia
Year:1991
Periodical:African Studies
Volume:50
Issue:1-2
Pages:219-241
Language:English
Geographic term:South Africa
Subjects:marriage
Women's Issues
Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
Cultural Roles
Marital Relations and Nuptiality
External link:https://doi.org/10.1080/00020189108707743
Abstract:Marriage styles in Grahamstown, South Africa, in the 1970s were characterized by variety and continual transformation. The couples interviewed by the author in 1976 were aware of the existence of two competing cultural scripts for marriage, labelled 'traditional' and 'modern' by the author. This article deals with the way the couples perceived and responded to these options. The research concentrated on three aspects of marriage: closure, jointness and marital fidelity. Informants produced sharply contrasted pictures of these elements in their models of the ideal 'traditional' and 'modern' marriage. Three case studies illustrate the problems and tensions which conflicting aspirations generate in marriages, and the way informants' constructions of 'traditional' and 'modern' marriage models were used, explicitly or implicitly, to justify these aspirations. Men mainly use 'Xhosa tradition' to justify their behaviour, while women use their own construction of 'modern times' to attempt to coerce their husbands into their own preferred marriage style. The fieldwork for this study was conducted between 1975 and 1979, but the central research, consisting of in-depth interviews with 12 married couples, was done in 1976. Bibliogr., notes, ref.
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